It is generally recognized that high blood cholesterol concentrations provide a significant risk factor in heart disease. It is also generally recognized that eating foods high in saturated fats, like many red meats may contribute significantly to increased blood cholesterol concentrations in humans. Correspondingly, the increased blood cholesterol concentration in humans seems to have a direct positive correlation with coronary heart disease. Accordingly, there is a continuing and real interest in decreasing the intake of food substances that have high cholesterol content. Thus, there has been in the past years a significant health trend away from red meat, milk products, and eggs.
Accordingly, there is a continuing and real need to develop techniques for decreasing cholesterol concentrations in food substances, and particularly in slaughter animals that are to be used in preparation of table meats and in eggs.
Cholesterol reductase is a known enzyme that catalyzes the chemical reduction of cholesterol to coprostanol. However, heretofore, it has been believed and found that cholesterol reductase is present only in certain bacteria. It has now been discovered that cholesterol reductase is present in certain green plant parts, particularly the leaves of green leafy plants, such as soybeans, corn, and cucumbers. It is believed that the applicants are the first ever to discover and take advantage of the existence of cholesterol reductase in green plant parts.
It is a primary objective of the present invention to provide a method of concentrating cholesterol reductase from green plant parts.
Another primary objective of the present invention is to use cholesterol reductase derived from green plant parts or from bacterial sources such as Eubacteria species A.T.C.C. 21408 to treat food substances that contain cholesterol in order to decrease the concentration of cholesterol therein.
It is a further objective of the present invention to provide a means of decreasing cholesterol concentration in cell membranes of the muscle of meat source animals.
An even further objective of the present invention is to decrease the health risk of people that use red meat and other animal products used as food, such as swine, poultry, fish, eggs, and milk products, by decreasing the cholesterol concentration of the food products.
The method and means of accomplishing each of the above objectives as well as others will become apparent from the detailed description of the invention that follows hereinafter.